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Monday, May 13, 2013

Record View: Devil is in the detail for SNP with package of welfare reforms to tempt voters

Record View: Devil is in the detail for SNP with package of welfare reforms to tempt votersNicola Sturgeon

NICOLA STURGEON'S intervention in the social welfare debate today is another attempt by the SNP to take their independence campaign to new ground.

Unable to shake the polls that leave the core independence message outgunned by 2-1, the nationalists are beginning to spell out what policies they would put in place to show the "benefits and possibilities of independence".

So Sturgeon, in a clear pitch to sceptical women voters, makes it plain that reforming the new universal credit benefit – that gives low paid women who are part of a couple a bad deal – would be a priority for her party.

We saw Alex Salmond test the water with promises of increased childcare in his recent conference speech.

We have always thought the referendum campaign and the debate on independence should be fought on what is in the best interests of Scotland.

Sturgeon has fired a salvo in that direction by making social justice her platform for independence.

But as always with the SNP, the devil is in the detail. How this package of progressive welfare payments is to be funded is a difficult question to answer convincingly.

Welfare benefits are paid at the same rate across the UK right now and there is nothing Holyrood can do to reduce payments.

But it takes only a little imagination from a devolved Scottish government, not independence, to top up the payments if they so choose. Obviously, the money would have to come from cutting other services.

Labour are firing up the big guns on social justice too. Gordon Brown will be back on the campaign trail today reminding voters that it is Scottish Labour and their contribution to the United Kingdom that is the real vehicle for social change.

These latest campaign developments must be welcomed if it means real policies that affect real people's lives are being placed at the centre of the political battlefield.A new low for Osborne

SCOTS living on the poverty line are already being crushed by the cuts in welfare and the rising costs of living.

Shockingly, on every working day in Scotland last year, 200 people had their jobseeker's allowance suspended. That sent thousands into instant poverty and financial crisis.

It seems clear that sanctions are being used as a tool to push people off benefits into jobs that simply do not exist.

As if the situation is not bad enough, George Osborne plans to introduce even deeper spending cuts in his June spending review that will last until well after the next general election.

He will be imposing a new cap on parts of the welfare budget as well as other areas of spending which have been immune so far from the Coalition's austerity plans.

But he will also be imposing a choice on other parties. Osborne will say he is wielding the axe for the good of the nation and he knows most voters instinctively agree with him that welfare should be cut.

By forcing Labour to stand up for those living in poverty he will try to brand them as the "welfare party".

It is a cynical, cruel, political dividing line built on the backs of the poor.